Dark Oil (8 page)

“We have to keep moving,” Jack said, “otherwise we'll doze off and we won't get any shut-eye tonight. No point going to the office, Dave Maine's still away. I say the camel market, people. Maybe the blacksmiths' after that, if there's time.”

Martin shrugged. “We wouldn't be very productive if we tried to work. We're ready for the Minister's meeting, anyway, whenever it happens, thanks in part to your paper, Lara. And I can't get onto email no matter how hard I try. We may as well go to the markets.”

“So you're in?” asked Jack.

“Of course,” snapped Martin. “I wouldn't let the two of you go on your own, even though I've brought a report I could read if I went back to the house. Don't you have any sense of what's appropriate, Jack? Lara is a married woman and we're in Negala. What would people think?”

Things were back to normal. The calm, induced by an excellent strategy report, a little sleepiness, a few moments of humility, had passed. The two males were at it again, showing their teeth, flexing their muscles, vying for supremacy in everything.

“If we're worried about what people might think, how about we try to appear civilised while we're here? I know we're Global Oil employees, but nevertheless.” Lara laughed, in an effort to appear light-hearted, hoping to diffuse the tension.

“Well, he started it.” Martin's lips formed an arrogant pout.

“Excuse me?” Jack was all fired up, nostrils flaring, cheeks cherry red.

Lara rose to her feet. “Gentlemen, the engineers over there will hear you. Don't be surprised if you're in the internal newsletter. He started it? Isn't that what five year olds say? We're all over-tired. We should get going.”

To her surprise, like little boys told off by their teacher, the men obeyed. Martin paid and the three of them dragged themselves back to the car. Lara wondered how the driver, who'd been sitting on the footpath in the shade of a nearby bush, got through the day.

“Should we ask him to come in with us next time?” Lara knew there'd be resistance from Martin, but Jack might side with her.

Martin shook his head. “It's what was agreed. Besides, he's lucky to have a job. He won't go home thinking he should have been in the restaurant with us. I'm sure it doesn't even cross his mind.”

She looked at Jack, tilting her head. He ignored her, until she said his name.

“It's a losing battle, Lara. My bet is, it does cross his mind and he'd love to come in with us. But we can't right all wrongs. He's not the worst off here. Look around.”

A sudden sense of injustice overwhelmed her. Perhaps they couldn't right all wrongs, but they could make a start, couldn't they? What were they doing if not making the lives of the local workers better, much, much better? Playing imperialists?

“I want to make a difference, Jack.” Her voice quavered.

“So do I, Lara.” He came closer to her, so close she could smell his cologne, again, and something more attractive: his warm skin. “But we have to act within the framework of what was agreed. We're doing a lot. Building a school, helping with the hospital. And one day, the revenue from the oil will make a real difference to all these people.”

Martin sniggered. “Unless a few government officials use it to feather their own nest. Transfers to anonymous Swiss bank accounts aren't unheard of. Anyway, bottom line is we're here to get oil and sell it, not for charity purposes. Nothing else matters.” As they all climbed into the car, Martin turned to the driver and without a please or thank you, muttered “The camel market.”

Jack leaned over to Lara and as his shoulder touched hers, she tensed her body to stop a shiver. “It's a good point, though. I'll raise it at the next project meeting, see what others think. You never know.”

He crossed his arms and turned towards Martin in the front seat. “You make it sound like getting oil and selling it is the only thing the company cares about and it's not. That's not how we operate and you know it. Sure, we have to make money. We have to keep the shareholders happy. But there's more to it. There are good people at Global, people with a conscience.”

Martin clicked his tongue. “Oh, please. If you think anyone's going to care about an illiterate worker, think again.”

Lara covered her eyes with her hand for an instant, breathing deeply to calm her nerves. The man had no shame.

They drove down the nearly empty main street, passing only two men on foot and a few battered cars. After negotiating pot holes that would have engulfed a small vehicle, the four-wheel drive turned left onto what seemed to be a track. Within seconds they were driving through the shanty town.

Lara had caught a glimpse of it before, when they'd first arrived in Zakra, but now she was amongst these people, who owned nothing but a few pieces of rusty tin, a few planks of wood from discarded pallets from the port. She could see their pained expressions, their worn hands, as the car slowed down.

Children with fly-covered faces stopped and waved to them, amused by the spectacle of white skin and a shiny vehicle. Lara smiled and waved back, but her heart was breaking. How many of these thin boys and girls would spend the rest of their lives in rags, without enough food to ever feel satisfied, dreaming of what could have been had they been born on a different continent?

Emaciated donkeys struggling under the burden of heavy drums, their beautiful warm eyes begging for a better life, trotted next to the car, their owners whipping them along.

“What are they carrying?” she asked after a while. “What's in the drums?”

“Water,” Jack said. “No mains here. They've got electricity, though.”

That was clear to Lara, even without Jack's comment, from the number of satellite dishes on the shacks. It was amazing. There was no running water but, she'd read, as many as thirty television channels—in any case many more than she had at home.

They turned again and the shantytown disappeared behind them. They passed concrete houses, small and grey, and a street where the homes seemed slightly larger. A few sported a sign on their façade, one saying in Negalese “Zakra's Best Bakery”, another “Fresh and Halal Meat” and Lara realised this was a shopping district.

After a while the buildings became scarce, with large tracts of land between them. Although there were no trees or plantations, no vines or lavender farms as she'd expect back home, Lara knew this was the countryside.

Around a bend and through a cloud of dust from the unsealed road, she suddenly saw a large gathering of people. As they got closer, she noticed they were all men in bright dwanas, standing in groups, gesticulating with fervour as they spoke. Towering above them were camels, majestic and awe-inspiring if only because of their size.

The four-wheel drive came to a halt in the open space near the camel market and they all climbed out. As she left the air-conditioned comfort of the vehicle, Lara wished she had brought a hat, and cooler, looser clothing. She had packed nothing but business clothes, dark and somewhat austere, assuming there would be no time for sight-seeing. And she probably would have been right, had the Minister not cancelled the meeting.

The driver waved to friends and, after asking Jack's permission, joined them with a spring in his step. Martin and Jack strolled through the market, with Lara in tow, struggling to keep up as her heels disappeared into the sand. Every now and then the trio stopped to admire one of the beasts although always from a distance.

Jack turned to Lara. “How's it going? OK?”

She nodded, but she was starting to wonder why they'd come here. It was just a holding place for camels that were being traded. The poor animals stood around groaning or bleating, shooing the flies with their tails as best they could, every now and then tugging frantically at their reins as men haggled over them.

“Do you want to pat one?” asked Martin. “Have a go. Don't stand behind them, though. They kick.” He held out his hand, encouraging Lara to come forward.

“I'm not fussed, Martin, honestly.” Lara took a step back.

The heat seemed unbearable to her now, perhaps because there was no shade in sight, or perhaps it was the smell of the animals mixed with the sweat of the merchants that made it intolerable. She felt nauseous and brought a hand to her stomach.

As her shoes sank into the sand again, she noticed it was a much darker, richer colour here. Still, nothing seemed to grow. There was no vegetation in sight.

Jack smiled softly at Lara, as if he sensed she'd had enough. “Maybe we should press on. I think we've pretty much seen what there is to see.”

Martin nodded, pointing to the left. “We'll go over to that side and then make our way back to the car.”

Within a couple of minutes they came to an area that was fenced off in a rustic, post and rail fashion. They were still in the market grounds here, but there were no people and no camels around. Nothing but large empty pens. Nothing except what looked like a sculpture at the far end of the last enclosure, or was it a struggling bush?

An unexpected breeze blew the sticky hair off Lara's forehead, and she closed her eyes with relief. It was wonderful to feel the air move again, even if the temperature failed to drop. As the wind picked up, the sculpture she had noticed seemed to twirl, twisting and turning upon itself.

In the opposite direction, in the distance, a man waved to Martin and Jack. They waved back and walked towards him.

Lara looked behind her again, still intrigued, trying to make out what the mysterious shape represented. “I'm going to check out that bit of Negalese art” Lara said. Neither of the men turned around. They'd increased their pace, as they approached the man they seemed to know.

She turned back and wandered over to the sculpture, away from Jack and Martin. For an instant, she pondered whether they'd heard her, but then she told herself it didn't really matter. They were in clear view and she'd only be a couple of minutes. She wasn't a child, after all and didn't need permission to take a few steps, did she? What could possibly happen? They'd stop and chat to their acquaintance anyway, and she'd have no trouble catching up with them again.

As she got closer the shape seemed to change, although her eyes still couldn't make out exactly what it was. A few steps more and she saw the bottom part was a solid wooden stick, taller than the fence, a gooey, brown liquid dripping from it forming a chocolate stain on the ground as it trickled through the sand.

Suddenly a cloud of flies lifted from the mystical object and Lara found herself gazing into the saddest eyes she had ever seen: the eyes of a slaughtered camel, its head swinging from side to side in the wind. Its jaw had dropped, exposing its yellow teeth. It must have bellowed for mercy when its head was severed, mercy that didn't seem to exist in this world.

She turned, looking for Jack and Martin, but she couldn't see them anymore. They hadn't waited for her, mustn't have realised she'd stepped away.

Her heart thumping, she ran, as if it wasn't the camel's life, but hers, that depended on it, her feet sinking into the blood-soaked sand. A market? Why did they call it a market? These were slaughter yards. She had to get out of there, before she cried, before she screamed.

As she rushed through the grounds and to the car, the market-goers approached her, touching her now that she was without the protection of her male colleagues. They marvelled at her delicate skin, her blue eyes, some calling her a white witch, others asking her to lie with them.

She continued to push through but the crowd grew dense and the dark hands that reached out for her multiplied, their fingers poking, prodding, pressing. “Get away from me,” she yelled in Negalese and the men took a step back, but her knowledge of the language startled them only for an instant.

The incredible, irresistible weight in Lara's limbs pulled her towards the ground. Her head spinning, her knees giving way, she collapsed. Closing her eyes she saw those of the poor camel's head on the stick and in her mind they wept.

As her back hit the bloody soil with a thump and she drifted off into unconsciousness, she sensed arms around her and she wished they were Tim's, wished she was home with her husband, wished he'd hold her more often like that. Why had she come here? What was she thinking? If only she'd realised half the perils.

Lara opened her eyes, squinting in the bright light. She felt the scorching sun on her skin and knew she was still in Zakra.

The toned arms wrapped tightly around her body were vaguely familiar, as was that deliciously attractive scent. And then she remembered.

Too embarrassed to look her saviour in the eye, she kept her gaze on the ground. “I'm all right, I can walk.” She expected he'd put her down there and then, but he held onto her as if she were his bride.

“Why didn't you stay with us?” Jack was furious, the way people are when they really care. “Do you have any idea what could have happened? You could have been kidnapped, sold, God knows! What came over you?”

She felt stupid; felt she had let Jack down. She couldn't bear to look at him. “I don't know. I saw something in the distance. I couldn't figure out what it was. When I understood it was a camel's head, I looked for you but you'd gone, so I took off. I just had to run. I couldn't help it.”

She'd never witnessed anything like that before, had never been confronted with the reality of slaughtering animals, the sad bellows, the frightened eyes as they sensed their fate. All she'd known until then were lean cuts wrapped in cellophane, neatly stacked on a supermarket shelf.

“It was irresponsible,” snapped Martin. “At the very least you should have let us know you were going off to look at something. One has to wonder if you're cut out for this.”

She closed her eyes. Martin was the one person she really didn't want to see right now, with his superior tone and his “told you so” attitude. “I did, actually. You mustn't have heard me. You were going over to see that man who was waving at you.”